


Arms Length

by killaidanturner



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Iron Man - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: Anxiety, Happy Ending, M/M, Poetry, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), prose, trigger warning: science
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-01
Updated: 2016-06-01
Packaged: 2018-07-11 12:42:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7051945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/killaidanturner/pseuds/killaidanturner
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He makes armor out of all the times he has failed, wears it like a second skin.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Arms Length

**Author's Note:**

> i mean tbh i don't exactly know where i would place this story time wise but it is before Civil War and after AoU so just toss it somewhere in there and it should fit. Honestly I live in a world where Civil War never happened so just go in that world with me :)

Tony remembers falling through the portal, he relives it every time he tries to fall asleep and his body jerks him awake.

 

He remembers the way his suit smelled like space, how the remnants of dead stars clung to the Mark VII. To Tony the smell wasn’t very different than his workshop, burning metal, gasoline. It made things difficult for a while, made going to the workshop to cause his chest to get a little bit tighter, his breathing to become just a little bit quicker. There are still days, years later, where he will be sitting at his bench, torch in his hands, welding; and it would all come flooding back to him.

 

How JARVIS went offline, how the last thing his eyes saw before they closed was an explosion of flames, bright against the star scattered sky.

 

He thinks of JARVIS temporarily, the years spent together and Vision who now walks in his place. He pushes the thought aside, not wanting to delve into too deep into any of that. Not when he has FRIDAY, FRIDAY who sounds a lot like Ana.

 

A small part of him, ok a large part of him, wishes that the first time he broke through the atmosphere he wasn’t carrying a nuclear warhead and trying to save the world. For a moment he wished he was seven again, telescope on the balcony as he looked out to the sky, to the stars and beyond. Because out there in the vast reaches of space was the unknown and back on earth the only way to look was down, and the only thing down was water, endless and dark with a frozen body lying in it’s depths.

 

The thing is, the stars cling to his bones as a reminder, burning malevolently under his skin.

 

* * *

 

Living up to expectations was something that Tony understood. Understood the concept of at least. He lived his life in the constant shadow of his father, in the ever looming dark cloud that was the loss of Steve Rogers, the only man his father ever admired.

 

“If they cut you open Stark, would you even bleed?”

 

Words ring in Tony’s head, play back to him like propaganda trying to wash his brain. It’s one of the first things Steve Rogers ever said to him.

 

If you were to cut past the flesh, break open the sternum, you would find shrapnel, pieces of desert sand still in his lungs. On his spine, each notch a different word, disappointment, expectations, failure, loss. They would all be there embedded into him, wired into him. Wired, maybe that’s more fitting? Circuit boards and little green pieces making up the man that doesn’t seem to care, doesn’t seem to feel.

 

He thinks of his workshop, of blue and green holograms, the quiet purr of the machines like a lullaby to him. Science has always been easy for Tony, something to take his mind off of things, something to help him from feeling. The thing is, he cares, probably too fucking much.

 

There’s a part of him that just wants to say, “Well maybe if Howard Stark wasn’t my father, then things wouldn’t be this way,” because doesn’t it all always go back to the parents? Doesn’t it go back to being a child and hearing how you weren’t good enough? How even though you tried, couldn’t you have done better? _Why can’t you be more like Steve Rogers? He was a good man._

 

 _Huh, seems we don’t know the same person._ Tony thinks as he looks at Steve now, all toned muscles and clean cut, just a tiny bit out of place with the slow drawl of his vowels from a different time. Because Steve Rogers is arrogant and stubborn, probably more stubborn than Tony himself and Tony is certain he has gotten an award for it.

 

He thinks about the first time he fell in love. He was six years old and it was on the hook of a story that his dad told him.

 

“-and Captain Rogers comes around the corner,” the thing is, the only time Howard Stark ever truly had a moment for Tony was if it was an opportunity to talk about Steve. Over the years the stories grew further and far between but Tony held onto the way his dad smiled, how he held his hands in front of his face as if he was drawing out the story as he spoke it. He had never remembered his dad so animated, so full of life. Outside of the few stories he was hard, stern, and sometimes cruel with his words.

 

The second time he fell in love was with a handshake, firm fingers around his slender ones. A hand on his shoulder, and quiet words of, “I should have never doubted you,” falling from Steve’s lips.

 

The third time, what’s that saying? Third times the charm. The third time is simple, is a casual pass between two _friends._

 

Steve tells him one day that he used to have a lot of freckles, pre-serum that is. Steve says he figures it was something in the serum that toned out his skin but that when he was younger he would connect the dots on his chest, on his arms. Run lines across his body, name himself Orion and called himself a great hunter, called himself something bigger than his bones.

 

“I don’t know why I’m telling you all of this,” Steve says with a small smile playing across his lips and his eyes down cast.

 

Tony doesn’t either, not really. He never fully understood the word trust and all of the things associated with it, not when it comes to anyone trusting him. It’s not that he believes that he isn’t trustworthy, more so that he doesn’t deserve to have anyone’s trust resting in his hands.

 

So he makes an exchange, balances the scales.

 

“When I was a kid, I used to go outside with a planisphere and a telescope and try to discover new stars or new planets. I messed around with the telescope, took it apart and rebuilt it I don’t know how many times.” He tells him that his favorite constellation was Apollo and that if Steve were to look at the sky now that maybe it would be the same for him as well.

 

“Didn’t he move the sun?”

 

“He moved the whole sky. He was also the god of truth.” Tony taps the counter, makes a rhythm against it. He’s not tapping out a beat but instead a code, zero one one zero one zero one one zero. If Tony is tapping out a message, a small declaration then he is the only one that needs to know. “A lot like you probably.” And with that Tony is pushing away, creating distance and making sure he keeps Steve at arms length.

 

Because Tony Stark apparently doesn’t know how to have friends.

 

* * *

 

He makes armor out of all the times he has failed, wears it like a second skin.

 

* * *

 

Black ink and newspaper headlines won't change the heart lines on his hands.

 

* * *

 

There are buttons done up his back, neatly put together instead of a spine. Steve asks him why one day, out of frustration, out of anger.

 

“Why do you do this to us Tony? Why can’t you cooperate?”

 

He snaps, tells Steve the truth because it’s not like anyone would believe it anyway. “If I follow orders all the time, if I listen to everything that everyone wants of me, I won't be me anymore. I’ll be stripped down piece by piece, because that’s what everyone wants, wear me down to the wires.” He doesn’t say bone, not the way he should. Steve looks at Tony quizzically, trying to understand his use of the word. It clicks, Tony can practically see the gears turning in the Captain’s head.

 

Tony doesn’t say that’s his second greatest fear, that he lets himself become crossed wires and a mechanical heart.

 

He doesn’t need to say it, Steve can read it in the bags under his eyes, in the tremor of his hands.

 

“I won't let that happen.” Steve says with conviction, like a preacher giving a sermon, because what doesn’t Captain America do without conviction?

 

The worst part is? Tony _believes._

 

* * *

 

When Tony lets himself think of Steve, allows himself the small moments where it happens, he equates it to a tragedy of Shakespearean proportions. He remembers the way Wanda’s magic worked itself into his brain, took control and showed Tony his greatest fear; Steve Rogers crimson soaked at Tony’s hands and Steve’s last words being how Tony failed him.

 

[ **PAIN** enters stage right. **HEARTBREAK** ascends, stage left]

 

So maybe red becomes hard to look at, maybe the red of the Mark suits speaks of too much blood.

 

[ **ANXIETY** takes **CENTER STAGE** ]

 

It becomes a problem. Not necessarily a problem that can be worked out, there’s no equation or formula that Tony can figure out but he looks for a solution.

 

The first solution is: just don’t use the suit.

 

That fails spectacularly like fireworks on the fourth of July lighting up the whole god damn fucking sky and Tony lets the suit encase him as he flies off because Captain America needs his help and Tony Stark apparently forgot the word no.

 

He’s adamant that no one will be hurt by his hands so he keeps building and tinkering. He still tries to avoid the suit and if people start asking why he just says it’s going under some remodeling and upgrades.

 

Eventually he fights against himself, fights against the thoughts spreading through him like a virus. Tony Stark has always been stubborn and he thinks to himself that the only way he can get past this is to _fight._

 

[ **LIGHTS DIM** only **HOPE** is left. **CLOSE CURTAIN** ]

 

* * *

There’s a certain way that Tony has managed to crawl out of hell on more than one occasion, it always seems to be with flames licking at his feet.

 

* * *

 

Steve says something about circuit multiplexers and Tony almost drops the screwdriver in his hand.

 

“Am I in the right universe or is this some dream? Maybe I died and I’m finally in heaven.” Tony ponders that maybe he finally died in battle, or that all of his bad habits had finally caught up with him and his body gave out in his sleep.

 

Steve grins at Tony, a small smirk that spreads across his features slowly. “I’m in your version of heaven?”

 

Tony hits rewind in his head, replays the scenario and tries to think of a different outcome. “No, but people who speak science are.” He thinks it’s a nice save but they can both see right through it.

 

* * *

 

It’s the way that Steve’s eyes seem to go gentle when Tony is running his mouth one day(a specialty of his), his hands out in the space around them, moving like they are painting a picture.

 

Tony stops in his tracks, unable to concentrate with Steve’s features soft, with his shoulders slumped and his body relaxed. He’s so used to battle ready Steve Rogers that he’s trying to figure out when Steve became gentle around him, when he let himself be Steve Rogers, kid from a borough in Brooklyn and not a soldier.

 

* * *

 

Their dynamic changes, they spend more time around each other. Mostly in silence. Steve draws and Tony works. They orbit around each other and Tony for a moment lets himself think if it’s possible for humans to have gravitational pull and if it is maybe he will be the first to discover it.

 

* * *

 

“What happened to us?” Tony asks one night, three a.m. when they both can’t sleep, too many nightmares clawing away at their minds, too many missed opportunities and things gone wrong. All the lights are on and only the buzz of electricity and their breathing fills the room.

 

“You stopped pushing me away.”

 

* * *

 

Steve’s hands are softer than what Tony was imagining, he thought that they would be hard and calloused from the shield, from the pencil that always seems to be between his fingers. They’re softer, smoother, as a thumb runs across Tony’s cheek. He chalks it up to the serum and bites his tongue to prevent himself from saying something stupid.

 

“Too long,” Steve whispers quietly against Tony’s lips and Tony thinks that he has to agree.

 

He feels the scatter of stars break across his knuckles.

 

His brain starts moving faster than himself, trying to memorize these new parts of Steve, his hands fluttering nervously.

 

Steve pulls away slowly, barely, only leaving a small space between them. He laughs gently against Tony’s lips. Tony opens his mouth to say something, some witty line but is cut off against by Steve, this time faster, this time hungrier.

 

Tony thinks to himself that he likes this distance between them better, like that the only thing between them now is nitrogen, four types of molecules. Tony starts listing them off in his head, wanting to find a way to personally thank these small parts of science and it’s like Steve knows exactly what Tony is doing so he kisses him harder, kisses him until Tony’s mind goes offline and all he can think is _Steve, Steve, Steve._

  


**Author's Note:**

> what tony was typing out in binary was "i never want to hurt you" 
> 
> i just have so many feelings about them both and i barely scratched the surface


End file.
